Feeding advice please!

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chotty

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My 6 year old Arab x cob is on the lean side right now due to being badly bullied at his last yard and losing weight from stress and not getting let into the haylege.
He is currently only in very light lunging work right now - 10/15mins about twice - three times a week. Other than that he is pretty much out 24/7 in a field of geldings with ad lib haylege that he's getting into!
I give him one feed a day as can only get up once due to uni/work.
I'm currently feeding him;
hifi's apple chaff - 2 big scoops
Bailey's number 4 - 1.5 scoops
Speedibeet - 1.5 scoops
And as of today - a big slosh of veg oil.

I'm not very good at knowing different types of feed and their nutritional/calorie value. This is my first horse in 6 years and my last one was a very good doer.

My horse seems to be putting on a little bit of weight, but he has been getting fed this mix of feeds since about the end of November and I don't feel like I'm seeing the changes that I want to see. I know there's no miracle cure, but to me he still seems lean and doesn't have enough fat on him to work off yet!

Is there anything else I can feed him to give him more calories but not fizz him up?

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I'm sure people with experience of feeding up a poor doer will be able to help more than me but the first thing that springs to mind is the scoop size. Are you using a stubbs round scoop? if so there is a very good chance that you are actually feeding too much volume.
I would ditch the vegatable oil in favour of micronised linseed oil, up to a couple of good cup fulls a day, the chaff I don't think has a great deal of energy in it, it's mainly a filler.
A horse's stomach is only about the size of a rugby ball which is approx 1 stubbs round scoop of dry food so in an ideal world no meal will be bigger than that and you would feed more frequently but as you can only get there once a day that wouldn't work.
Remember your horse is already gaining weight and slowly is usually the best way.
What about weekends, can you go twice then? Have you a friend that would give your boy a feed so that he got two a day or are you there long enough to be able to give a feed when you arrive and another when you leave?
Regarding nutrition most company's put the speck of their feeds on the web, it's just a question of looking.
 
Agreed. If its the big round scoop then that's to much for one feed. Best bet would be to find some way of getting more than one feed in a day.
 
The chaff is a waste of space if you want weight gain as he already gets forage. Tbh I would ring one of the feed company helplines in your situation. Be good if you can weightape horse beforehand, and ideally weigh the scoops of each feed so you can tell them exactly what he is currently on.
 
Hi, thanks for your replies! It's not the big round scoop, it's like the smaller shovel shaped one? I don't even think the one i've got is actually a horse feed one, think it's like a cat litter one or something! It's about a big handful size roughy :s
Ah okay, so should I just call baileys or something? I'm so crap with stuff like this! I don't have a weight tape, is there any other way I can get a rough idea of his weight?

I've just moved to this new yard so don't know many people yet of who I can ask to give him a feed. I'm trying to train my mum up though so that she can pop one in to him! :)

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its the right time of year to be lean and if the fields are big enough so there is grass then i would not be feeding at all the weight will come asthe grasscomes through
 
You might be better off contacting a feed company about theres feed try afew tho some may try to sell you the whole range

seeing the words veg oil makes me cringe it's a popular choice but it's not that good for them there's plenty of articles that go in all the things it can cause

if you really want to feed oil i would go for something like flax oil / linseed oil


http://compare.ebay.co.uk/like/2211...ixedPriceItemTypes&var=sbar&adtype=pla&crdt=0 I bought this and topped up with a big tub i think 5 litres at 22.50 i only feed 20ml total i wouldn't feed much more than about 50ml if you wnat the link for the bigger tub i can find it for you :)
 
Thanks purple18! I'll buy a bottle of that when I get payed. Do you feed it every day or only 3 times a week like the description says?

I'm going to call a couple of feed companies tomorrow :)

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Get rid of the chaff, it will add no calories. We feed our Old Lady, who is no longer a good doer, grass nuts and speedy-beat. She keeps her weight well with this. Do be careful of feeding too much cereal.
 
chotty said:
Thanks purple18! I'll buy a bottle of that when I get payed. Do you feed it every day or only 3 times a week like the description says?

I'm going to call a couple of feed companies tomorrow :)

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Click to expand...

I feed it every day but at a lower dose 3 times a week ended up being to confusing for me I forget to put it in or put too much in. I suppose it's whatever suits you best :)
 
Have a read up on micronised linseed, you can order it from Charwood Milling quite cheap, I think it's about £30 for 25kg and they deliver so might work out cheaper than oil in liquid form.
Cool Stance Copra is supposed to be non heating and very good but often if you have a chat at your local feed store they can point in the direction of something similar/cheaper though I think it's only about £17 for 20-25kg.
As you are using a small scoop it's difficult to estimate the weight of the dried feed, ideally not more than 2kgs at a time.
This is taken from the Baileys site for Baileys No.4, ash is just a filler, so look for as low a number as possible, the digestable energy is the amount of calories so for weight gain the higher the better, most feeds are around 10MJ/kg

DIGESTIBLE ENERGY 13.5MJ/kg
PROTEIN 12.5%
OIL 5.5%
FIBRE 9%
ASH 6%

I don't know if this helps or makes things worse but bear in mind the feed companies will only be able to tell you about their feeds not other manufacturers.
 
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